


Run

by ranereins (shadowintime)



Category: Chaos (2011)
Genre: Gen, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-05
Updated: 2011-06-05
Packaged: 2017-10-20 04:31:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,250
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/208763
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowintime/pseuds/ranereins
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Michael had taken the job as leader of the ODS, he had realized that he would be responsible for lives.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Run

**Author's Note:**

>   
> ***** Major Spoilers for 1x05 - Mole *****   
> 
> 
> I guess you could call this a missing scene fic... definitely more towards the end of the fic. Just an idea that came to me during the ep. Beta'd by sgflutegirl.
> 
>   
> 

They had all known the risks of Rick taking Felipe’s place in the burnt out store; cartels never liked dealing with new people, especially when it came as a surprise to them. As they watched from the store across the street, Michael, Billy and Casey had all been holding their breath, hoping for the best but expecting the worst. Michael had thought it a supremely bad idea and it went against ever fiber of better judgment that he possessed, but Rick had volunteered… insisted even… and this mission could potentially save who knew how many people.

They had all breathed a sigh of relief as the men left with their money and the passports, thinking that, for once, luck was on their side and there wouldn’t be any trouble. So, when the automatic gunfire rang out, their hearts leapt into their throats and their worst fears flooded to mind.

When Michael laid eyes on Rick, his first thought was ‘ _thank God, he’s still alive_ ’. His second was ‘ _oh God, the wound is bad… he might not live much longer if we don’t get him help fast_ ’. Sparing a glance at Billy and Casey, he could tell that theirs was much the same.

As they loaded Rick into the van, Michael realized how much blood Rick had lost. His pants were soaked to the point of dripping and there was even more pooled on the floor back in the shop. When Michael had taken the job as leader of the ODS, he had realized that he would be responsible for lives. He realized this more and more each time they went into the field, especially when they got into situations where people tried their best to kill them. They’d always managed to come back, though there had been close calls before.

The worst had been a couple months after Billy joined the team; a mission in Russia where ‘between a rock and a hard place’ would have seemed like a delightful reprieve. Billy had caught a ricocheted bullet; it had punctured his lung, which collapsed, and between the blood loss and the cold it was a constant struggle to keep him alive and get out before they all caught bullets. Nothing since had come anywhere close to that bad… they had become complacent.

This, now, with Rick’s blood all over his hands… it was like reality had punched him in the face with the force of a sledgehammer while simultaneously ripping his stomach out. He stared at Rick until Billy yelled at him and brought him out of it. He slammed the door, wiped Rick’s blood off of his hands on his pants and got into the driver’s seat, speeding off as quickly as the van would allow.

Michael often glanced in the rearview mirror at Rick as he broke the speed limit in spades trying to get to the clinic. Rick was becoming paler by the minute and the pain was becoming so intense that he was no longer able to keep quiet, though he tried to stifle it as much as he could. Michael couldn’t have been happier when Casey gave Rick the morphine lollypop. Even if they couldn’t do anything else for him right now, at least they could make him comfortable. That was something.

When Rick shoved the lollypop in Michael’s face, offering him a lick, it had startled him. He was so intent on driving and worrying and praying to anyone who might have the ability to listen that it had taken him off guard and he had handled it badly. It was stupid, amateurish, and now the van was wrecked and stuck.

After several attempts to get the van unstuck failed, Michael stared at Rick who stared back in a morphine haze. God, that look… even through the haze, he could see all the trust. Rick trusted him with his life, no matter what the circumstance, and it wasn’t just because he didn’t have much choice other than to right now. Any other time, he would be glad to have all that trust given to him, but when someone’s life hung in the balance… he couldn’t let Rick down, it wasn’t even an option.

When he asked Casey to stitch him up, he could see the fear in the man’s eyes. It wasn’t that he couldn’t do it, he’d seen Casey perform field surgery more than few times, no, the fear was more that he might fail and even Casey was in the mind of ‘failure is not an option’. Despite how their relationship had started, they had come to like, even love Rick… he was their brother now… and trying to imagine the team without him now was unbearably painful.

“How far is the clinic?” he asked Casey.

“Fifteen-and-a-half miles, exactly.”

“Well I’d better get started then.”

“Started what?”

“Sit tight, I’ll be back with a doctor,” Michael said as he took off running.

Fifteen-and-a-half miles was daunting to say the least. Michael only ran a few miles every morning and, though he always knew that he could run more were he so inclined to, that many miles, pushing himself as hard as he could was going to take him to and maybe beyond his physical limits. If it saved Rick though, he didn’t care if he wasn’t much more than a pile of goo afterwards.

His legs began to cramp after seven miles. They were screaming, begging for him to stop. At eleven miles, he began to stumble every now and then, his legs threatening to give out at any given moment. He thought of Rick, the trust in his eyes, how they’d planned to go out for beers once they got back… Rick had drawn the short straw and was supposed to pay, but if he made it through this, the drinks were on Michael for the next month. The thought of Rick teasing him (“ _aww, you do care_ ”), egged on by Billy and Casey brought a smile to his face and the pain seemed to disappear from his legs, his lungs from sucking in a little too much air and the wind blowing against his face somehow gave him a second burst of energy.

It was almost surreal as he ran the last four-and-a-half miles, like time had slowed and he was speeding through it. He could almost see the waves of air coming off of him in shades of green and blue. Maybe that was dehydration.

When he reached the clinic, everything seemed to happen in a blur. He remembered bursting through the doors and practically falling against the reception counter. The woman behind it pulled him up from the floor, helped him to the chair and told him that she would get a doctor. Then someone was shining a light in his eyes. At some point, he guessed he’d managed to tell them about Rick because they were in a car speeding down the road that he had just run down and a bottle of water was being forced on him.

When they arrived, the doctor jumped out of the car and looked back at him. “He’s in the van, help him!” he said as he stumbled out of the car and towards the van himself.

Billy crawled out of the van to allow the doctor more room. He smiled at Michael and said, “you made it… and just in time too.”

Michael grinned back just before his knees gave way and he succumbed to the dehydration and exhaustion.


End file.
